Sawatch

The snowpack in the area we traveled is more supportable and deeper than the areas I traveled the last few days (Fremont Pass and the west side of Tenmile Range). The snow depth is consistently 90 to 105 cm deep on northeast through southeast-facing slopes near treeline. Even below treeline at around 11,300 feet, the snowpack was still about 1 m deep. The snowpack stratigraphy is less a faceted junk pile like the other areas mentioned, and more layered, where we could pick out distinct weak layers and slabs formed during recent storms that have not lost all strength yet. Three distinct layers are- the upper snowpack faceted layer mentioned above, a very weak layer of faceted snow beneath a hard melt-freeze crust about 45 cm, and our ever-present depth hoar. Only the top layer would propagate in ECTs and only on southeast-facing slopes. We didn't get any propagating results on east and northeast. In propagation saw tests, the bottom two layers would propagate to end after a 35 to 40 cm cut length (PST 35/100 END). For loose wet issues, it was a cool morning with a slight breeze. The afternoon really warmed up, but we saw minimal signs of wet instability. On a steep southeast-facing rocky area, I was able to push moist snow downhill for about 10 feet, sliding on a melt-freeze crust about 30 cm down. There was no rollerballing observed in surrounding steep terrain. No loose dry issues were observed.